Chapter 859: Mural. Live Forever.
Just inside the cabin was a staircase leading down. Upon entering, Bai Xiaochun couldn't see Song Que, but did catch a glimpse of Master God-Diviner at the bottom of the stairs.
He hurried forward and then climbed cautiously down the stairs, which put him on the first deck below the main deck!
The instant he stepped onto deck 1, he caught sight of both Song Que and Master God-Diviner, looking around with wide eyes.
The fact that they were both there unharmed caused Bai Xiaochun to breathe a sigh of relief. Without any hesitation, he hurried over to their side.
Deck 1 wasn’t very large, and much like the main deck, was completely empty, except for another staircase off in the distance, leading further down.
However, the bulkheads were covered with a massive mural!
It depicted the sky. It was not an ordinary blue sky, but rather, looked more like an ocean covered with waves. In fact, were it not for the occasional clouds floating about, Bai Xiaochun wouldn’t even have been able to tell that it depicted a sky.
Most shocking of all was that the enormous mural also depicted a huge hand. The hand occupied nearly half of the sky, and was pushing down from it toward the land below!
Just looking at the mural caused Bai Xiaochun’s mind to start spinning. For some reason, it instantly filled him with a pressure that was difficult to put into words.
Furthermore, he experienced a sensation of utter despair, as though this hand contained the power… to destroy the world!!
The ground in the mural was parched and cracked. Standing upon it were three astonishing giants, whose expressions didn’t contain even a hint of the fear of death. All of the giants’ hands were stretched up to fight back against the enormous hand descending from the sky!
There was nothing else in the mural except for that. Bai Xiaochun had no idea exactly what it meant, nor did Song Que or Master God-Diviner. However, it was a shocking sight to look at.
A long moment passed. Bai Xiaochun was the first to come to his senses. Face ashen, he backed up a few steps, mind spinning with both fear and pain.
“How can a mural have such shocking power!? It stabs you all the way to the heart and soul!!” At this point, he realized that Song Que and Master God-Diviner were just standing there trembling, their eyes bloodshot and filled with despair. Therefore, he swished his sleeve and sent a burst of power into them.
Song Que shivered, blood oozing out of his mouth as he regained his senses. He staggered backward, his expression one of confusion. As for Master God-Diviner, his cultivation base wasn’t even close to the level of Song Que’s right now, so he coughed up a mouthful of blood and sagged in place.
“What kind of mural is this!?!?” he said, gasping for breath and not daring to look at it again.
At this point, Bai Xiaochun looked at his companions and, realizing that Master God-Diviner was a bit closer, edged over to his side. “This place is too weird!” he said. “Let’s go back. We can look for a way off the galleon back on the main deck. I have the feeling things will only get more terrifying the further down you go!”
However, even as the words left Bai Xiaochun’s mouth, Song Que suddenly burst into motion, heading directly toward the stairs leading to deck 2. It only took him a moment to reach them, whereupon he instantly began to climb down.
Master God-Diviner did the same thing, completely ignoring Bai Xiaochun. Bai Xiaochun reached out and grabbed Master God-Diviner, but the moment he did, Master God-Diviner spun in place, a vicious expression on his face as he let out a soundless howl.
As he did, a green-skinned, long-fanged ghost face appeared on top of Master God-Diviner’s face. Bai Xiaochun felt a blast of power pushing his hand away, and then Master God-Diviner was gone down the stairs!
Bai Xiaochun was shaken, and an unsightly expression could be seen on his face. His heart was also starting to pound. After all, his words from moments ago had actually been a test!
He had noticed on the main deck that something odd was going on, and decided to see if he could figure out what it was. Obviously, this galleon was controlling both Master God-Diviner and Song Que!
“That green-skinned, long-fanged ghost just now… looked exactly like the one on that flag outside!”
With that, he turned to go back up the stairs to the main deck, only to find that… the staircase was gone!
Goosebumps broke out all over him, and his face turned as ashen as death. All of a sudden, this place seemed even more sinister than before, and his heart was pounding so hard and loud it was like a drum.
“What do I do, what do I do!?” All he could do was grip tight the command medallion the gravekeeper had given him. That was where all his hope lay.
“I'm the Hell-Emperor’s Master! There aren’t any ghosts or souls in this world that would dare to provoke me!!” Scowling on the verge of tears, he tried to work up some confidence by pulling out a tongue of multi-colored flame. Then, he gritted his teeth and headed toward the staircase leading to the next deck.
It was really too terrifying to be alone. Furthermore, he couldn’t just sit around and watch Song Que and Master God-Diviner be controlled.
“Dammit. If I had known things would turn out like this, I would have gone back to the River-Defying Sect alone!” Regret pricking at his heart, he advanced cautiously toward the staircase, at the bottom of which… was deck 2!!
As soon as he arrived, he exercised the utmost caution possible. He rotated his cultivation base and sent some divine sense out in all directions in the hopes of detecting anything unusual. He absolutely did not want to be surprised by anything like that mural.
However, deck 2 was a bit different than he had imagined. There didn’t seem to be anything dangerous about it all. Furthermore, it was a lot bigger than deck 1.
There were no murals, only flickering, yellow candlelight that made the area a bit dim.
Furthermore, right in the middle of the deck, there was a rocking chair!
It sat there, still and unmoving, seemingly completely ordinary in nature. Right in front of the rocking chair were two corpses which were little more than skeletons!!
They were on their knees in front of the chair, one corpse apparently that of a man, the other, a woman. One skeleton appeared to be made of gold, the other crystal. Although they were kneeling, from their posture, it looked like they had been embracing each other.
It was a terrifying scene to begin with, but it was made more bizarre… by the fact that the two embracing corpses’ heads… were fusing together! The process wasn't complete; they were only half-fused. But it was bizarre nonetheless!!
The mere sight caused Bai Xiaochun’s heart to seize with fear. To top it all off, Song Que and Master God-Diviner were standing motionless right in front of the two corpses.
“Are they going to get fused together too!?!?!?” Bai Xiaochun had no idea what was going on, but he was convinced that this place was terrifying and bizarre beyond reason.
Something seemed very strange about the whole situation, and it had his heart pounding. After studying the scene for a moment, his gaze slid from Song Que and Master God-Diviner to the corpse with the golden skeleton.
After looking at it more closely, his eyes widened dramatically!
“That's the aura of the Undying Live Forever Technique!! It’s… the manifestation of the complete Undying Codex!!” Bai Xiaochun’s adam's apple bobbed up and down with fear as waves of astonishment crashed around in his mind. He was by no means mistaken. After all, he cultivated the Undying Codex of the Undying Live Forever Technique, just like the Blood Ancestor and this golden skeleton!
“If this golden skeleton mastered the Undying Codex, then… the corpse with the crystal skeleton must have cultivated….” Almost immediately, he realized that the corpse with the crystal skeleton still had abundant life force left in it, as if it were the type of thing that could live forever!!
“The Live Forever Codex!!” Bai Xiaochun had known from the very beginning that the Undying Live Forever Technique was broken up into the Undying Codex and the Live Forever Codex. However, he had never encountered the latter, only the former. Never could he have imagined that he would unexpectedly encounter two corpses that had both cultivated the Undying Live Forever Technique!!
His mind felt like countless bolts of lightning were striking it. However, he still didn’t understand why these two people, who had cultivated the Undying Codex and Live Forever Codex respectively, would be fusing their heads together….
But then, a chill ran up his spin, and his hair began to stand on end as… the previously unmoving rocking chair… suddenly began to rock back and forth!!
Furthermore, it was just possible to make out the shadow of a person sitting in it….